(A little bit of trivia here: the only reason the prophets were
divided into these two categories was that some prophets wrote very long books and they became known
as the Major Prophets, and all the
others wrote shorter books and
became known as the Minor Prophets.)

To make good sense of what the Prophets were saying, they really
need to be seen in their historical
and cultural setting, and there needs to be an understanding of who they were talking to, and why.

But generally speaking,
the individual books of the prophets tell the story of each one’s life and/or
his teaching.

Some of the prophets’ messages involved the future, and some of
their messages were very strange.But
predicting the future was not
their major role.The prophets’ task
in life was to proclaim God’s word.They were God’s ‘mouthpiece’
(so to speak) and sometimes they spoke to individual people, sometimes to a
particular tribe or sometimes to a particular nation.

Their main basic job
description was to correct the moral
and religious life of God’s people.They attacked idol worship, and delivered stinging rebukes when the
rich and powerful were abusing and/or ill-treating the poor and helpless.

The previous category of
books called The Poetry and Wisdom,
belong to the golden age of God’s people (during the time of King David and
King Solomon) when the nation was stable, safe and prosperous.But the Books of the Prophets belong to the dark ages of God’s people,
when the nation had become divided.Dark because the people were turning away from God and embracing the
false religions of their surrounding nations, and many of these religions
involved living extremely debase lifestyles.Therefore God raised up prophets to bring his people back to him.

Needless to say, the
prophets’ messages were never popular!And as a result, the life of a prophet was always tough.They were
badly persecuted even by their own people.Many received death threats, some were stoned, some imprisoned and
some killed with swords.

Unfortunately, the order
in which theses prophetic writings have been collected is not historical
order.The list above gives the biblical order, but if you intend
studying the prophets in detail at some point, I have designed a schematic
diagram showing them in their historical order, and showing how they fit into
the history of the divided kingdom and the period of the Exile.The chart also shows whether they were
addressing the northern or southern kingdoms.Just click the icon at the bottom left of the page.

NB: When you
open it up the prophets are all written in red and the kings are in black.

Well, that is very basically what
this section of books is about.And that
has brought us to the end of the Old Testament section of the Bible.So, congratulations again!Just quickly, review the Big Picture again by clicking the Contents Page button on the left
nearer the top of the page.And then
feel free to explore the next bit – The New Testament.